When a mysterious hallucinatory plague sweeps the utopian megastates of the 21st century, a plague-carrier awaiting his end in a shabby bar is told by a stranger that the plague is a gift for all survivors if they’re willing to embrace it. The stranger begins his tale…

When frustrated genius and privileged reality engineer Hugo Bernstein has his safe and predictable life fatally sabotaged, he’s pulled from the wreckage by Crisis and the Urban Hunt Club, charismatic renegades who have their own plans for saving a disintegrated USA through the popularisation of a consciousness-altering narcotic.

Aided and thwarted by a carnival of macho DJ’s, rogue MI’s, obsessive femme-fatales, psychotic war veterans, alcoholic chemists, avuncular assassins, gerontocrats, Agents of the Senatorial Inquisition, suave fixers, and rented bicycles Crisis and Hugo become the unlikely catalysts of a revolution that may liberate mankind, or may destroy the perfect society.

Welcome to the end of the world as you know it. Sod utopia; it never was much fun anyhow.

I’m a fan of science fiction in general, but there are certain authors whose books I’ll pick up purely because they’ve been written by minds I love. William Gibson opened the doors to a pioneering digital dystopia which I still see echoes of today. I could always rely on Iain M Banks to robustly explore utopia with some of the most elegant writing known to man – coupled with funny swears and whimisical AI spaceship names, naturally. Neal Stephenson will never go back to his pure cyberpunk days of ‘Snow Crash’ and ‘Diamond Age’, but when he’s evolved to explore multinational MMORPGs and just all of philosophical thought ever in a giant space opera (looking at you, ‘Anathem’) I wouldn’t want him to go back to the cosy familiar cyberpunk days.

‘Hunting Party’ reminds me of these authors. It’s filled with potent silken prose, almost-familiar yet freshly handled utopian themes and some of the best descriptions of munted behaviour at wonky parties I’ve ever read. The words are a keenly-faceted stone; they hurt. The characters knocked me for six. The themes were all grown-up and stuff, sure, but this is the first time reading a book has felt like getting a VIP pass to one big riotous, system-shaking party.

I’ve known Ken Mackriell for years. We’ve been to wonky parties. We’ve chased dragons together – no, wait, let me rephrase that, I am 100% referring to LARPing and hitting costumed people in damp Welsh fields with rubber swords. I had no idea he’d end up writing one of the finest literary sci fi novels I’ve yet read. How did that happen? I don’t know. How do really good books happen? I don’t know.

But now I’ve read ‘Hunting Party’. Now I’ve caught the plague, and everything is fine.

One day I look forward to seeing ‘Hunting Party’ in print. Then I will sit it next to the works of Gibson, Banks and Stephenson on my bookshelves where it belongs. That day will come faster if you, a fellow lover of literary sci fi, click on Hunting Party and read the book for free.

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The Mookychick website and community was born in 2005 to be an alternative feminist haven of inclusivity and joy. Mookychick is more than the sum of its parts. All our members actively help each other - and you won't find a wittier, thinkier or kinder bunch anywhere.